Transcripts
1. Introduction to the class: Welcome to this class on
print demand one oh one. In this class, we're going
to break down how you can start an online business
with print on demand. If you have no design experience or on a really start up budget, I'll walk you through
all the steps that you need to know about, the things that you
need to research so that you can get started. What we'll cover is we're going to look at print on demand from start to finish and discover how to create your
first sellable product. That's really important. A step by step plan to open
your first online store. We'll talk about websites and if you're going to use
other site studies and launching your first live
product and making sure that it is optimized to the full
and people will notice it. That is me on the
right hand side. I'm Donna and I
will be talking you through all of this
in this lovely class. Crack on with your first lesson.
2. Picking the Right Products: In this lesson, we're going to look at picking
the right product. When you first hang out
with print on demand, you want to keep it simple. A lot of new sellers
get really excited and try to launch dozens of
products across every category. It's better and way less
overwhelming to start with one or two product types
that are proven sellers. First of all, start with
beginner friendly products. Think about products people buy again and again and again. T shirts, for example, always in demand,
easy to design, mugs, they're great
because they're low cost, quick to produce,
great gifts as well. Tote bags are the same, they're easy to customize. Waart posters, you can
choose any kind of design, every size is perfect for what people are looking
for and phone cases. These everyday items are
what people want to buy. They're great for gifts and they're great
selling opportunity. The next thing you
need to think about is consider picking a niche. It's much easier to sell
a funny t shirt for dog lovers than a random
funny T shirt, basically. Niche products feel a bit
more personal and people love buying things that feel like they were made
just for them. Some of the popular ones
you've got pet owners, fitness fans, coffee lovers, teachers, bookworms,
that type of thing. Have a think about the niche. Think about who your
audience could be. You don't necessarily
have to niche right now, you might find later on where you're
discovering all about, what works and what doesn't might find your niche later on. But it's worth having a little
think about that avenue. Also, when it comes to
picking the right product, you need to think about
product qualities to look for. This is looking at the print on demands app, website,
whatever it is. Have a look at them. Think about the everyday use of
them. Are they giftable? Will they appeal to
emotional buyers? Are they light and
easy to ship as well? Have a think about
that because this will all add up to when you do
your marketing efforts, when you start promoting it. Have a think about all of
these types of things. When it comes to
print on demand, there are so many
options out there, but you need to think about what people are
actually going to buy. So I've given you a
few examples here. For example, these are really
good first product ideas. For example, dog m t shirt
with a simple poor graphic. Then you've got coffee first
then conquer, little quote, funny on a mug for
entrepreneurs, book lovers tote bag
with minimalistic text, AOVs your quote will
print for home offices. When I'm giving you
these examples, you can think about
those niches. The first one, dog m t shirt, you're looking at pet owners. The next one is entrepreneurs. Business owners is quite
funny for mugs, great gift. Uh, book lovers to, you know, for your bookworms out there and motivational quotes is good for the same as entrepreneurs, business owners, you
know, that type of thing. Have a think how these
link into your niches and then think about the ways that you could promote it later on. Lastly, here's a few key
tips to think about. Why simplicity matters?
Think about this, it's easier to design,
faster to launch. The simpler your design, the easier it will be to launch. It will be a lot faster
than you spending los time faffing around,
doing this this. The next key tip I will say that ties into simplicity is focus on proving bestsellers before experimenting with what you're doing when it comes
to print and demand. Have a look who is doing what, what works, how simple the designs are and
work from there. Most people tend to
do a Pinterest board of some ideas and things that they like and think they recreate and
that type of thing. Do a bit of homework,
spend some time looking at what works and have a look
at what you can do as well. With print on demand, you do not need to have a
lot of design skills. You just need to think
about who your audience is and get smart with what
you're selling basically.
3. Creating Designs That Sell: So in this lesson, we're going to cover off
creating designs that sell. You do not need to be a
professional designer just so you know to create
something people want to buy. In fact, some of the
highest selling print on demand products out
there currently are incredibly simple. Think about a t shirt with a funny one liner in a nice pun, that's it, just like my picture. Simple sells better than clustered images
majority of the time. So if you're very new to this, keep it simple,
smart and sellable. Currently, the top types
of designs currently that work really well are
the text based design, so short phrases,
quotes and slogans. This is an avenue
you want to go down, start compiling an
Excel sheet with all those phrases
that you can think of that you really are interested in creating
and go from there. Then you've got
minimal graphics, so small icons, simple shapes, fun doodles, that type of thing. Typography driven as well, so doing different types of
fonts that work really well. If you're into doing
that kind thing, definitely test out because it's really popular thing
at the minute. And the trend inspired design. There's a lot out
there with Boho, retro, cottage core, which
is a very new one to me. I didn't know where that
was until I Googled it. But there's so many
different trends out there, spend some time researching what works currently on some of these
different platforms. So when it comes to finding
your winning design idea, research is going to be
your best friend here. Do not start Print on Demand
shop without doing this. Take 15 to 20 minutes, browse top selling
items in your niche. Notice how many are just simple, clean designs, write
down anything you think, yes, I like the idea of that. I can do that. Brainstorm it. Do it on a big piece of
paper and write it all down. But what you have to remember
when it comes to designs, they need to be high
resolution and printable. When it comes to sign
your research, try ETC, Red bubble, T Public, go on to other social
media things as well. So look at Pina, TikTok, Instagram, look what's
currently trending. And focus on evergreen
niches as well, so we've covered niches as well. I niches is a big thing
for you when you think, I love to just create loads of stuff around pets, fantastic. But your research will massively help you
because you can type that inter pet gifts and that type of thing,
see what comes up. So now we're going
to cover tools. These are probably the easiest
tools out there currently. If you're really
new to all of this, these are the ones that you
weren't going to look at. Canva, I cannot
rate highly enough. I've been using it for
years and years and years. It is great for beginners. Huge library of fonts,
elements, templates. It is great if you're going to be doing minimalistic texts, that type of thing,
great for it and you get high quality
PNGs from this as well. So it's a good thing as well. Kittle is great for advanced typography,
logos, that type of thing. Creative fabrica
is actually really good for illustrations and
bundles and things like that, which you can import
into other things. You have to look into what you can use and what you can't
because it's licenses. Place it is great
for mockups as well. When it comes to marketing your business and all
your products and stuff, place it is going to
be a really good one. Once you've got it, once
you've got design concept, it will do it on mockups on T shirts and whatever
you're supposed to be on, it will help massively
sell what you're doing. And one final thing
that I will say, this is a legal reminder. It's really important
to understand this, you do not want to
get in trouble. First of all, do not copy
other sellers designs. Use them as inspirations. Don't copy everything,
for example, a massive quote absolutely fine. There are certain things
that are absolutely fine, but if you are
duplicating basically somebody's work the same styles and the wording and everything, you will probably
get into trouble with that if they find out. Only use fonts and graphics and quotes you have
legal right to use. You just got to be
careful about this. Make sure when you're downloading
anything, for example, if you go one of the
websites I mentioned, any illustrations, that
type of thing that you've got full use to
use it basically. Always check those
download licenses because they're really,
really important. Go off, do your research, brainstorm as much as much
and much as possible, have a look at the
tools I've mentioned, see what you can use. If Canva is a little
bit too hard for you, it can be a lot. There's a lot of tools on there. Research other ones,
see what works for you. There are plenty of tools out
there to get you started. These are just the top ones
that I've gone through that I think are absolutely brilliant
at getting you started.
4. Choosing Your POD Platform: There are two main paths when it comes to selling
print on demand, upload directly to a marketplace
or build your own store. That is what we're going to be covering in this next lesson. So first of all,
marketplaces like Redbubble, T Pub, Society six are amazing for getting
quick exposure. You can upload your design, set a price, and
they do the rest. But competition is fierce and usually you earn a small
percentage of your sale. So it might not be worthwhile, but I'm going to go over
the pros and cons of this, and then I will do
the same for having your own store so you understand the differences between them. So this might suit some people and the other way with website
might suit everyone else. So the pros of this are instant access to
millions of buyers. There's no upfront
marketing effort needed, so nice and easy and
very easy for beginners. So if that sounds like,
this might be worth a try. However, the flip coin of
that is higher competition, lower control over branding and customer experience and
low profit margins. So let's look at
creating your own store. If you want to build a real brand where customers
come back to you directly, EX connected to print on demand provide Printify or
Printifle is the way to go. It does take more
time to build up, build up the loyalty, but you can make a lot more profit
from this long term. How it works for this
particular thing is you basically create a storefront and a brand identity and name, what your company is about,
something quirky sometimes. Then what you do
is you connect it to a print on demand supplier. What then you'll
have to do is handle your marketing and
customer communications, that type of thing. You're doing a lot of legwork when it comes to your own store. The pros and cons with basically,
we'll start with pros. You get full control
over branding, pricing, and customer
relationships, fantastic, higher potential
for profit margins, which sounds great
and the ability to build an audience and an
email list for future sales. However, you must drive
your own traffic, so that's through social media, SEO, ads, et cetera. There is a lot more setup and maintenance required
compared to marketplace, and you do need to handle basic customer
service questions. That's a bit of a thought
for both of them. What I'm going to show you is, these are the most common print on demand suppliers
out there currently, and then what we'll
do is we'll cover off how to choose
what's right for you. So Printer fall is
a very popular one. You get high quality, but with that comes a higher price
basically for the base price. You do get a lot of
good branding options, custom packaging,
that type of thing, which is quite nice and
customers really like it. However, you've got Printer fi, which is a little bit
different and the fact that it's got a bigger catalog. So you've got multiple
suppliers that links into them. The products do tend
to be a lot lower, but the quality depends
supplier to supplier. You're not really sure
what you're getting. Then the last one is a
couple of more options. It depends on your
type of product, your niche or
anything like that. There are other print on demands that do specifically,
say, for example, just t shirts, you just have
to research those ones. But these are the main ones
that you'll see out there. So let's come to the final
slide of this class, which is, I want you
to ask yourself this. Do you want fast exposure
and a simple setup? Yeah, then start with
the marketplace. Or do you want more control
and a branded business? Then Etss probably more suitable to what
you're looking for. Are you willing to
learn marketing skills to grow your shop? Then own store makes sense? Are you planning this as a side huss or a
full time business? All of these questions affect your decision
on what you do now. For example, if you decide
to do it on marketplace, but then what you're finding is there's too much competition, but you're really struggling
with the fact that you can't do more about it and
you're itching to grow it, but you can't because
it's on the marketplace. Then that's the point
where you'd be like, actually, I'll move on
to Etsy or my own store. So it's entirely up to you spend some time thinking
about what works for you if you have the
time, the energy. You've got some
marketing basic skills so you know what you're doing, or you're willing to learn
it. That's the beauty of it. This can become a side
hustle, a full time business, whatever you want it to be, but it's all depending on
what you want to do with it.
5. Setting Up Listings for Success: Let's look at setting up
your listings for success. First of all, titles. Your title needs to be clear, specific and have
keyword rich titles. Basically, think
about how you would type in something when you're searching for something and
what it would bring up. That's what you
need to be thinking about from the
buyers perspective. What are they typing in that will get them to
reach your products? Think of those keywords. A really good source for doing
this is looking at Etsy. Think about what you're
going to be creating, perhaps maybe you're
at that point. Basically just type it
into the search bar and see what comes up on
the first couple of pages. Note down those
keywords that people are using because they will benefit you in
the long term when you're creating your descriptions
for all your products. Next is your description. I've got an example on
the right from Etsy. Open with a short
engaging sentence, what the product
is, who's it for. Then you want to include
about the benefits. Why people love it? What are they benefiting from? Then you need to list the technical details
like the size, material, shipping information, anything relevant that
people need to know. Use bullet points throughout. It makes it nice and easy
for people to skim read. Most people will not read a massive chunky
paragraph included. I would say the first
couple of paragraphs describing it are fine and then include the
details underneath. Then comes the next part
which is the pricing. For this, this is
another research project for you is look at
your competitors, find out the average price
range, they sell things. Then from there, set your prices to cover
production, shipping, any fees if you're doing it on Etsy then
include that fee into it. For example, if a mug costs
seven pound to produce, price around 15 to 18 depending on your niche and
what everyone else is doing. But that's just a rough guide. So for all of this, what I would say, a good tip. This is how I learn to do
this is get an Excel sheet, have different tabs or
use a Word document, however you want to do
this and set it out. Research titles, research descriptions, what
you can include in it. Do the researching of pricing. This will help you when it comes to setting
up these listings. I'll make them go really quick. You know exactly who
you're targeting and your listings will be optimized as much as they can to reach the right audience. Next, mockups. Mock ups are really important. I said in the last lesson, there is a website
called Placet, but Canva offers mockups. There's tons and tons
of websites out there. The print on demand, if you're
going directly with them, they'll offer some
images and stuff, but mockups are
really important. Mock ups, you want to
use real lifestyle mock ups of the product in use or it's presented really nicely. Choose different angles as well, so people can see it
from different sides as well. It's nice to see. People like to visualize
things before they buy them. It's really important
that you've got some really decent
looking mock ups. For example, you can see, I've chosen a theme
of coffee mugs. What you can see is that they
are in different settings. You've got one that's
just on a counter, you've got another
one with coffee going in and then you've
got one being used. This helps the buyer basically visualize
how they would use it and it's important that you get really good quality
photos for this. But like I said, there are
tons and tons of tools out there that can help you create
these amazing pictures. The last part of this lesson, which is really important is optimizing for
search engines. SEO, which is basically
what it stands for. What this is, this is how your listing will
get found basically. So in your description
and in your titles, you need to use
primary keywords, both title description and in the tags if you're
using Ets that is. Think about what a
customer would type in. This will fall back
into your research. If you do all the steps of
researching everything, at this point, you don't need to worry about the SEO because
you've already done it. You've done the research. You
know what you're writing, you know the keywords, you know how people are
going to find you. Those steps are
leaked to this point. When you do a listing as well, try to use natural language. Don't use too many
words as well. What I've done is I've got
an example on the right. For example, this
person has done loads of different words
around two people in mug, they've linked it
to a funny gift, funny mug, funny mugs,
mug, coffee cup. Funny gifts, gift for her, Christmas gift, birthday gift. What they're trying to do is they're trying to
get into all of those audiences using
those specific keywords. For example, if you're
doing mugs, for example, you can do gift mug
because it's linked, people might type in
the word gift mug. They might look for
just mugs on the room. This person is really
thought through, they've done their homework
in what audiences and what specific keywords will
reach the right audiences. That's why they've chosen
to use those words. In the description,
they've been very detailed about what
the product is. They've talked through
the benefits of it and they've used some interesting words like
unique a great product. They're using very positive language throughout
their description. Don't forget to do that as well. Make it a positive
description throughout. This is what you're getting, this is why you should do it. This is a perfect present,
that kind of language. I will say a quick tip. Think this is really
useful is if you are struggling with descriptions
and you're not a wordsmith, it's just taking
you far too long. Use hatiBT, use AI tools. They are fantastic writing
descriptions for you. Just make sure that you say what optimize and tell it what
it's doing its purpose. For example, Etzy again, optimize this description for Etzy so it reach my audience, which is, for example, pet lovers and it will optimize your description as much as it can so that it reaches
the right people. I hope you enjoyed that
and on the next lesson. It
6. Marketing Basics (Without Feeling Spammy): Lesson, we are going to be
covering marketing basics, so we're going to do it in a way that makes it feel
less spammy basically. Whiny marketing, a great product is basically invisible
without marketing. People don't know
about it, they're not going to find it basically. Even marketplaces reward active sellers who
drive traffic, so either option that you choose either marketplace or if you choose to do
your own website, you can drive traffic to both, but it's more heavily on
the website side of things. So it's really
important aspect of just basically getting your
products out there basically. Marketing is simply
storytelling. It's not meant to be salesy, it's about connecting
with people, it's driving people to
something that they need. That's the whole
point of marketing. So first of all, start simple. Pick one platform and
I mean one because it is a lot of time and effort to spread yourself across
multiple platforms. Choose something that
you enjoy doing. You've got different platforms
to choose from, really. First of all,
you've got Inscram. So if you're more into
creating visuals, reels, behind the scenes,
content, all of that, and that is appealing,
Inscram is the place to be. Pinterest is great for
evergreen traffic. If you are to be fair, it is actually going to
be a really great one because it's quite
a visual place. You could show mockups of your designs,
that type of thing, of your products on Pinterest, and it does get a lot of traffic and it also gets found on
Google Search as well. Then you've got TikTok. If
you're always on TikTok, then TikTok is the way to go for you. You're on
there all the time. You'll enjoy it a lot more. You'll probably have a better understanding
of what works. Finally, Facebook, so
Facebook is still useful, but I would say for
the niche audiences. So if you were going to go
down the Facebook avenue, what I would say is join Llosa Facebook groups
in that niche. So if it's about dogs, you know, join them and then
what you can do is you can comment on
things or you can promote dog oriented sort
of products in the groups. So it makes it quite relevant. So think about what kind of platforms you like using
and just stick to one because it'll be
easier for you to put your time and your energy
and stay consistent. So what to post? This is the point
where you're thinking, God, what do I put
on my socials? Well, here's a few ideas. You can use your
lifestyle photos of your product being used, which we've actually talked
about in an earlier lesson. It's great to show it in use. People love that type of thing. You could do behind the scenes, show how you're designing it, the upload or you could be like, I'm uploading a new product. Let me I'm going to show you
how I do it kind of thing. You could do funny means that connects the audience's
niche, like dog lovers, you could basically
do some funny jokes and things around that and then you could link off
to love my jokes, then you'll love my store. You could link
absolutely everything you're posting into your store. You just got to see it in
a clever way, basically. Customer stories and
reviews are fantastic. Always put them on
every single route, stick it on your socials
because it is great for people to see the more
reviews they see, the more they'll trust you, the more your audience will grow. Lastly, look at
trend jumping posts. This is in particular, I would say for TikTok quite a lot. So if you see something
trending on TikTok, try and tie it into
what you're doing. Think about how you can link it and try and stay on
top of some of them. Seasonal events is always
a good thing as well. So if it's that time of year like for example,
dog lovers again, you could tie in
a product around dogs about winter staying
warm and things like that, and you could tie it into
seasonal things as well. When it comes to marketing, what you're trying to
do is you're trying to build trust
through your content. What I will say is share
more than product photos, try and tell a story of your designs, why
you created them, how it is perfect
for the person, the meaning behind it, and try and be really
authentic as much as you can put your
mistakes out there, put your winds out
there, your growth, things that you've learned,
that type of thing. People love knowing the
story behind what you do because it builds trust and they get a
better understanding. People don't buy from
a faceless business. That's how you got
to look at it. And what I will say is
invite people, your friends, your family,
everybody to like or share or big up what
you do as well. You can share it by word
of mouth or tell people, by the way, really
great products. Here's a link to
it kind of thing. It's all about getting your products out there,
getting them more visual. This is the final part of
this lesson in this class. This is the most simplest way of basically marketing
yourself for a beginner. So use three to five relevant
hash tags where you can. So I think pretty much
all the platforms use hashtags. Some
will use more. So you can integrate them in. Try and post three to
four times per week, plan it out, what
you're going to do. What I will say when you're planning out those
three to four posts, don't do all promotional. Do a mix of funny, do educational, do
a bit about you. Mix up what the
messages is each day, but the call to action. In the captions and
everything else, put in visit my store, blah, blah blah, or check out this
product, that type of thing. What you're trying to do is
you're trying to build up audiences that aren't going to get sick of seeing your
promotional stuff. Nobody wants to
sign up to a page and it's got its promotion
promotion brochure. It gets boring. They want to see your personality
shine on marketing, show it as much as possible. Create promotional
graphics using Canva. Canva is a great tool. There are plenty of
other ones out there, so if you're using something
else, feel free to use it. Plot it out. What I
would say is create a series of post templates
and just reuse them. You do not have to keep recreating posts in something
different every time. If you've got a standard
template, use it. Pin products to Pinterest
as well. You can do this. You can link websites,
you can link stores and all sorts
of things that go directly to your store as well and make sure that
you read purpose content. So what I will say is if you do decide to do more
than one platform, or you're already on a couple of platforms
currently the minute, and this is a new
avenue for you. Um re pup is content
across all of them. Don't have to create brand new, 20 new posts for Pinteras, 20 for Isagram, 20 for
Titok all different ones. Repub is across all of them. It's a case of majority of the time of just resizing them. Instagram posts are a
different size at the minute. Pinter pins, and TikTok
are very similar sizes. If you do use Canva, it does tell you what
sizes they need to be and you can resize them as well. That's really useful too. I hope you learned a
lot from this course. What I will say is
do your homework. Like I said, build
up a spreadsheet, put everything that
you need on it, before you start, do
all your homework, research your keywords,
research your competitors. I will help you then research what you want to be doing.
Do you want to do quotes? Do you want to do text, and then start looking
into marketing, how you're going to market it, what platforms
you're going to do. Then once you started building your store up, however
you choose to do it, marketplace or website, then
crack on with marketing it. Get as much traffic as you
can on there because it will help grow your audience and
will get you those sales.
Donna Townsend, SMM | VA | Entrepreneur
